Don't Let Me In Read online

  “They checked the CCTV cameras that cover Merton Street from there. Nothing for the time when I would have dropped Finn off. They said they would send a patrol car by over the next few days, at dropping off and picking up time.”

  He moves towards me and goes to place his hand on my arm but I pull back.

  “You didn’t keep a copy of the picture – well I guess you can’t – so I wonder, is it possible that you somehow…” Henry pauses and gives me his “understanding and concerned” look that makes me feel the fury ignite in my stomach.

  “Don’t,” I say to him.

  “You’ve been under so much stress. I know you don’t sleep well, and with all the pressure of the show, maybe you transferred some of the stuff in the show on to your natural maternal concern and saw something that was real to you?”

  I shake my head. “He’s not going back to school.”

  Henry’s face flushes an angry red and he jabs the plate at me again.

  “What do you suggest?”

  I try to ignore the jibe and tell myself to focus on achieving the result and to keep my features in a neutral expression.

  “We could move schools. I don’t know, maybe home teach for a bit?”

  “No! He’s not going to be locked up in here like you, afraid to go out because of something you caused! I won’t let that happen to him.”

  He shakes the plate and I watch a piece of mangetout fall to the floor and land next to his foot.

  “We need to catch whoever sent that message, that’s what we need to do. If the police can’t help then we need to do it ourselves,” and as I say this I jab my finger at him to emphasise the point.

  He snorts, a gesture that makes his face screw up and look meaner and older.

  “It could be anyone. You’ve got a lot of enemies. These trolls are everywhere. I told you what would happen if you did these podcasts, it just stirs people up. It’s an open invitation to them to waltz into our lives and into our home.”

  Is Henry referring to the “incident”? If I ask him directly he will deny it of course, so we do what we always do, ignore it, not so gently float around the subject.

  “It’s Frenchie, I’m sure of it.”

  “So what? It could be any of them. They are legion, aren’t they? I’ve seen your Twitter feed. You are public property and if you keep up with this podcast there’ll be more. You have got to stop this. Why isn’t being a mum to Finn” – he reaches out his hand and awkwardly takes hold of mine – “and a husband to me enough for you?”

  I bite.

  “How is this my fault?”

  Henry snatches his hand away and I can see he is trying to say something but rage causes his mouth to flap hopelessly, as the words murder each other before making it to his mouth.

  “I only want him to be safe,” I say.

  Henry’s words reach a truce with themselves and charge at a mutual enemy.

  “He’s not going anywhere. And if anyone has put him in danger, it’s you with this stupid fucking podcast, winding up fascists and fucking nutters. You! Your fault. Just like–”

  He stops himself but the attack has been made.

  “Why don’t you say it?” I whisper.

  He wants to say it was my fault. I can see it in his face and I realise part of me wants him to say it too, and if he does, this will break something for sure, but maybe it needs to break. He raises the plate and I can see it in his face; he wants to throw it at me.

  And then his face changes. Disgust is replaced by something worse: fear and helplessness. I turn and look and see that Finn is standing at the kitchen door. Christ knows how long he’s been there.

  Henry puts the plate down on the counter and quickly walks over to the door and picks up Finn.

  “Come on, son, you’ve had a long day, you need your rest.”

  Finn looks back at me from over Henry’s shoulder. His big brown eyes are full of tears. All I can think is that I’m failing in every way to protect those I love, or am supposed to love.

  After they leave the kitchen I take the plates out the dishwasher and wash them down with water from the tap before careful reloading the dishwater plate by plate. Only when they are lined up in their racks do I close the door.

  When I get into bed the duvet wall is firmly in place. I think about stretching out a hand to reach for Henry but then I hear his breathing. It’s shallow and full of tension and I know he’s pretending to be asleep.

  Instead I get out of bed and go to the bathroom. Once in there I take my mobile phone out the pocket of my dressing gown and text Hannah.

  It’s a simple message:

  One of the trolls took a picture of my boy at school. I need help.

  I wait but there’s no reply. I type the same message to Mo and hit send.

  A reply comes within thirty seconds; it’s from Mo.

  I’m on it. Will call tomorrow.

  When I go back to bed Henry is still faking sleep. Maybe it’s because I know Mo will help, but I fall asleep straight away.

  13

  This is a Call

  Something happened and I’m not sure if it is a good thing or a bad thing. I received a voicemail message.

  I replay it again.

  The voice is one I have never heard before but had already imagined. It’s thinner, reedier than I had conjured up. I had imagined a booming baritone to go with the booming temper I was sure he had, but he fails to live up to my imagination.

  I hit “2” again.

  “Message received Monday 8 November at 8.32am: ‘Hello. Is that Mrs Kelly? It’s Tom Ellis here and I would like to talk, clear the air so to speak, keep lawyers out of it, eh? All they do is eat up money. So please call me back when you get this message. It’s important for both of us’.”

  He doesn’t sound threatening at all. He sounds desperate.

  I don’t call him back straight away. Instead I wander through the deserted kitchen amongst the remains of Finn and Henry’s breakfast blitzkrieg. I shake a fallen packet of cornflakes, checking for any stragglers, but it’s just corn powder. The butter which has only recently replaced the “healthy spread” lies melting in the middle of the table covered in the dust of toast fallout.

  “Protect and survive,” I whisper out loud, thinking of the 1970s UK government pamphlet on how to survive a nuclear attack.

  The house is quiet and even Lil’Bitch is nowhere to be seen. Henry must have already fed her otherwise she would be rubbing up and down my leg right now, trading purrs for food.

  I open the fridge and grab some yoghurt. I locate the muesli box hidden under a copy of The Guardian and pour a generous helping into a bowl with the yoghurt.

  I eat and enjoy the silence. I often wonder if part of my not leaving the house is the fear that the sheer sensory overload of the city would wipe my brain clean like an electromagnetic pulse. The silence is like a warm duvet and I relax into it.

  The buzzing of my mobile phone breaks the peace. I look at the display and see that it’s Mo trying to call me. I let it ring out. My feelings towards Mo are complicated. In working on his brother’s case, I realise now there was always an unspoken dynamic, that I was helping him, but now with my cry for help a new rhythm has been sounded and I’m not sure how it will play out. So I let the call ring out whilst I debate whether the late-night decision to involve him stands up to my daylight, rational self.

  By the time I finish my cereal and drink a cup of coffee I’ve made my decision and I go down to the basement.

  It’s even quieter down here and cooler too. I feel nervous as I set up the computer system and the recording equipment but when I put on the headset all my nerves vanish. It’s as though I’m a different person, stronger and more real, grounded less in my incorporeal fears but in a purpose that feeds me.

  I dial the number and within three rings there is an answer.

  14

  The Hunt

  Cinnamon rolls, crisp with iced toppings, lie on the table like a map of the galaxy. r />
  Mo reaches for one of the dark swirls and, with obvious relish, pops half of it into his mouth in a bite that screams mindfulness more than a million self-help tapes. As he chews, his eyes scrunch up with enjoyment; here is a man truly in the moment.

  I can’t help but watch him and take my own pleasure in his simple delight. I wish I could lose myself in this way but “I” am always there, commenting, criticising, judging as to whether the moment measures up to what it could be.

  Whilst he eats I take out my phone and take a picture of the plate of pastries. It will make a good ’Gram post later.

  “Thanks for coming over, Mo. I’m meant to be helping you, not the other way around.”

  He puts the other half of the pastry down on the plate in front of him and then rubs his index finger along his moustache, sending a flurry of white icing sugar down towards the table.

  “I love cinnamon rolls but if I keep eating them I’m sure to get fat, ha! As for my help, it is the very least I can do after everything you have done for Khalil and for my family.”

  “But…”

  He raises one of his large hands.

  “Your child was threatened, your family.” His eyes narrow and then flash with anger. “And to attack your family is to attack my family. That is how I see the world Sarah, family is everything and you do everything you can to protect them. The police” – he waves his hand – “don’t want to know because no one was hurt and your persecutor will think he is safe and he will continue to threaten you. I read the emails and posts you sent me. Disgusting garbage from a sick mind. No, not a sick mind, for that would be excusable if he were ill, but a mind allowed to think he is untouchable and protected, that he can strike out in the darkness with impunity, and make no mistake, such a person is dangerous. The more they get away with the further they go. I’ve seen the results on my rounds.”

  An image of Finn, lying prone and lifeless on the pavement outside of the school, flashes into my mind. Mo must see this expressed on my face.

  He reaches his hand towards me and it hovers above the cinnamon roll galaxies.

  “But that won’t happen here. We are going to hunt this Frenchie down and stop him from harassing your family and allow you to concentrate on setting Khalil free. Yes?”

  I nod and muster up a faint smile. It’s hard not to believe this gentle bear of a man and the calm assurance he gives out.

  “Good! This is settled then.”

  I can’t but help think of Henry’s limp response to the threat to our child and compare it with Mo’s certainty and strength and how he makes me feel. He makes me feel stronger, he adds to my sense of self. And Henry, how does he make me feel? I push the thought to the back of my mind.

  “How will you find him?”

  Mo’s hand descends and plucks another roll from the plate.

  Before he puts it in his mouth he smiles with his eyes.

  “Hunters follow tracks. He will have left some, you can be sure, and we will hunt him down. But this is for another day,” he takes a big bite of the roll and his eyes roll up in pure appreciation of this moment, this sensation and I envy his ability to take pleasure when and where he finds it, “will you join me? They are delicious and you must save me from getting fat.”

  I shrug. “Why not?” I pick up one of the rolls and take a bite. He’s right, they are delicious.

  Later that night as Henry sleeps upstairs, I WhatsApp Hannah.

  Hi, are you around? Big news!

  Her status changes to online almost immediately.

  Yo girlfriend, tell all, just enjoying (****?!) bath time here.

  I quickly type.

  We are going to hunt Frenchie down.

  Her answer doesn’t come straight away, in fact it doesn’t come even after a minute, which is a lifetime in a WhatsApp conversation so I send her another message.

  You ok?

  Her reply pings back straight away.

  Sorry! That is fucking fantastic, who is “we” though?

  I type quickly: me and the handsome doctor.

  Do you have any idea who Frenchie could be? Isn’t it impossible to track down these trolls?

  We don’t know yet, Mo is helping me, I think he is going to get his private investigators to track him down.

  There is a noise from the stairs. It’s a squeak I recognise; it belongs to the third step up from the hall. I strain my ears. I can’t hear anything else but I have the distinct impression someone is standing outside the door.

  I tell myself not to be stupid but I know all the noises of the house. I have lived them every day for over a year now and they are as familiar as my heartbeat, and so when something changes, however imperceptible, I notice it before I can identify it. And something has just changed, and the air feels thicker as though someone or something has added to it.

  Hang on, Hannah. Think Henry may be outside listening.

  Fucktart you ok?

  I don’t reply; instead I carefully raise myself from the sofa and, breathing and moving as quietly as I can, make my way to the closed lounge doors.

  I stop when I reach the door and listen. At first all I can hear are the usual rhythms of the house, the central heating’s slight hiss and gurgle, quieter since the last service, but still there as a chugging back beat to the melody of the movement of air through the house, the delicate drafts and mistrals of window edges, keyholes and Victorian brickwork. But then, there, another sound, regular, the sound of suppressed breathing, as though someone were trying not to be heard.

  What if it’s not Henry? What if it’s Frenchie or someone worse? What if it’s him, returned to finish the job he started twelve months ago? I look around for a weapon but nothing but the table lamp presents itself so I bend down, slowly, and unplug the lamp. I gather the cable in my right hand and hold the lamp base in my left, poised to strike.

  I use the fingers of my left hand to grip the doorknob and then gently I twist it until I feel the click of the bolt come free. As soon as that happens I pull the door open and get ready to bring the lamp smashing down on the head of Finn who is standing there, a blanket in one hand, his red fire truck in the other and a look of terror and confusion on his face.

  I sink to my knees, dropping the lamp and then enveloping him in my arms.

  “Are you okay, my love?”

  I pull back, terrified that I’ve scared him, but he rubs his eyes.

  “I just wanted a story,” he says, and the tremble in his voice causes such depths of self-loathing and fear that I’m infecting him with my anxiety that I want to run screaming as far as away as possible to protect him from me.

  Instead, I take his hand; it feels so small and delicate it could break my heart.

  “Come on, I’ll read you one. What about The Very Hungry Caterpillar?”

  He pads alongside me as we mount the stairs.

  We reach his bedroom but before we enter Finn pulls on my hand.

  “What is it, my sweet?” I ask him.

  He looks up at me with his dark eyes, so full of innocence.

  “Can Daddy read it to me instead?”

  I shouldn’t feel envy about my son wanting his father to read to him instead of me. I shouldn’t but I do. It’s an honest request from my little boy, a boy who doesn’t feel reassured by his neurotic mother. I kneel down and bring my face close to his.

  “Daddy’s asleep so it’s me and you tonight. Is that okay? Daddy can read to you tomorrow.”

  He sucks his bottom lip in.

  “Suppose so.”

  I get him into bed, tuck him in and then squeeze next to him.

  Way before The Very Hungry Caterpillar has formed a cocoon, Finn is asleep, and although I should rejoin Henry, I feel sleep dragging me down into an abyss of exhaustion I can’t resist, and then I’m gone.

  15

  Who is he?

  “Who is he?” I ask.

  Mo is back at my kitchen table and this time he has brought Chelsea buns and a blue cardboard folder.
r />   He cocks his head to one side and then smiles. The wrinkles around his eyes have been joined by bags and dark circles that speak of a sleepless night.

  “Your tormenter, the stalker of your children and of you, is a twenty-three-year-old student of economics, one Marcus Evans. He lives with his mother in New Cross and works at a call centre in the daytime dealing with PPI complaints.”

  Mo opens the folder and tips its contents onto the table. It’s a series of black and white photographs all of the same man, a scrawny twenty-something with bad skin and patchy facial hair.

  “This is Frenchie?”

  I look up at Mo. He has just begun eating one of the Chelsea buns, and he nods vigorously, causing a flurry of icing to fall and land on the table.

  I fan the photographs out across the desk as though I’m in the CIA or something. I’m not going to lie, it gives me a subversive thrill looking at the images of this normal-looking young man. He looks like a student who should be out protesting about something or another, not knowing that I am observing him, and I can’t help but wonder if this is how he feels. It’s power.

  “How did you find him so quickly? Is it legal?”

  Mo chuckles and I can see he’s enjoying this. It must be a break from being a surgeon, and perhaps it counts as light relief to him? I dismiss the thought as uncharitable; he’s the only man helping me right now.

  He licks his fingers as he talks.

  “I wish I could tell you we tracked him down through some tricky software or satellites or something but the truth is rather more prosaic and certainly legal. We used Facebook.”

  “How?”

  “Pretty simple really. My cousin ran a search against all of his usernames and we got lucky with the variant FrenchDuck1066. You’d be surprised how many hits there were. People tend to use their online names like their real name, habitually, and that’s what we got. Dating profiles, chatrooms, even newspaper below-the-line comments sections. None of it was useful though, as it still only had the ‘Frenchie’ tag line variation, except one, a user profile on Breitbart. This was a Frenchie1066. We looked back through his comment history and found one posting about the London Bridge terror attacks; it referred to his local paper, the Hampstead & Highgate Express.”